No big surprise that THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM took the took spot this week, pulling in around $3.6 million.
Strangely, Universal reported it was on just 219 screens, far less than KOBIS’s 404. Certainly seems like a screwup to me. If BOURNE was on just 219 screens, it would have had a huge per-screen average. And the theater I saw it in was respectable, but not huge.
Btw, what’s up with people saying this BOURNE was really good? My girlfriend and I found it horrible. Just way too much of everything (except plot) (and nuance). Re-watched THE BOURNE IDENTITY, and it is amazing how much more interesting the original is.
After BOURNE, the next six slots all went to Korean movies. No one really stood out, but together they accounted for the bulk of last weekend’s admissions. As of Monday, Korean movies were back over 49% of the year’s box office.
MISSION POSSIBLE gets my vote for worst English title for a Korean film so far this year. Just bizarre.
| This Week | Title…………………………………….. | Release Date | Screens Nationwide | Weekend Attendance | Total Attendance |
| 1. | The Bourne Ultimatum | 9.12 | 404 | 402,298 | 485,207 |
| 2. | Mission Possible: Kidnapping Granny K (Gwonsunbunyeosa Namchisageon – Korean) | 9.12 | 462 | 307,504 | 390,559 |
| 3. | The Two Faces of My Girlfriend (Du Eolgul-ui Yeochin – Korean) | 9.12 | 454 | 235,020 | 341,426 |
| 4. | The Happy Life (Julgeoun Insaeng – Korean) | 9.12 | 380 | 179,951 | 257,272 |
| 5. | My Father (Mai Padeo – Korean) | 9.06 | 347 | 150,749 | 620,777 |
| 6. | Mother Never Dies (Eomeonineun Jukji Anhneunda – Korean) | 9.12 | 135 | 73,932 | 88,970 |
| 7. | May 18 (Hwaryeohan Hyuga – Korean) | 7.26 | 170 | 31,757 | 6,831,706 |
| 8. | Disturbia | 8.30 | 135 | 31,320 | 568,998 |
| 9. | No Reservations | 8.30 | 87 | 17,951 | 361,011 |
| 10. | D-War (Korean) | 8.01 | 68 | 10,741 | 7,833,164 |
(Source: KOBIS – Figures represent 94% of nationwide box office)
Oh, and D-WAR is officially the biggest Korean movie ever in America now, thanks to its $5.4 million weekend. Hate to think about how much the distributor paid for prints and advertising, but still it broke the record.
I’ll never, for the life of me, understand how a BRILLIANT movie like ‘Old Boy’ was not marketed in the U.S. but crap like ‘D-Wars’ gets the luxury of being heralded as “the biggest Korean movie in the U.S. ever”. God, the injustice. Why is it never movies like ‘Sympathy for Lady Vengeance’ that get the attention in the U.S. but badly acted, un-intelligent nonsense like ‘D-Wars’? It’s irresponsible of Korean filmmakers as far as I’m concerned. They either lack artistic vision (not being able to tell crap from real art) or they think Americans are dumb and will just run after whatever has the biggest budget and the most special effects.
Sadly, I think it’s the latter. They think we are too stupid to know what good movies are.
I practically cried seeing D-Wars being played in my local cinema. I heard that D-war’s director (that nutjob) had some deal with Sony that went way back, hence all the advertising. Beyond that I have no idea — even The Host, a monster movie I think that was quite marketable in the US on a grander scale (and far more subtle and palatable) didn’t get this much PRing.